With computer systems, alerts in the form of prompts, dialogs and the like often appear on the display to tell the user something specific, such as a warning or reminder. Typically this is accompanied by some audio data to draw the user's attention to the alert. Some alerts fade away, while others require that the user specifically dismiss them to ensure that the alert was not missed while the user was away.
People can also receive information in other ways, often without consciously recognizing that they are doing so. This is particularly true when nothing unusual is occurring; the data is subconsciously noted, mentally processed as normal, and then effectively discarded, or at least not brought to conscious attention. However, when something unusual is occurring, such as a light illuminated in one color when normally it is lit another color, or a blink or flash of a light when normally the light is steady, the unusual data that is being conveyed will gather attention. Over time, users become trained to intuitively recognize the meaning of such information when is important to them, or occurs frequently enough that the information is not really unusual, just different.
Except for specific alerts (or the absence of them), computer users receive very little useful information about what is actually going on in the computer system. Some of the scarce information that users do receive is whether the various external components of a computer system are receiving power, typically as indicated by an LED on each component. Keyboards typically have indicators for the NumLock and Caps Lock states, (and for Scroll Lock), and disk drives tend to have an LED and/or make an audible sound when being accessed so that the user knows that any delay is normal I/O delay. A few other basic indicators might be provided, such as a battery charge level indicator on a laptop, a media player LED that lights when in use, and so on. These indicators may provide some useful information to the user, but it is very limited.
Moreover, not only are there few external indicators for users, each providing very limited information, but there is no general consistency on what a given indicator means. For example, one component may use green for powered-up and amber to indicate receiving power but in some rest state, while another component may use amber whether powered up or sleeping, and not lit at all when switched off. Further, the indicators are located on each given component, scattered around the computer system, e.g., the power light is typically on the main housing, the media player light is on the drive, and/or the main housing, often making it hard for users to see without consciously making an effort to look for it, such as on a floor-standing personal computer.
What is needed is a method and system in the form of indicators that provide useful information to computer users for many types of state information, in a manner that is consistent as to their general meanings in the context of each indicator's component or device and with one another to a general extent. It also would be beneficial if the indicators were positioned so as to be easily visible without specifically looking for them, at locations that are logical and allow the state information to be subconsciously observed.